Thursday, December 17, 2015

Report: 55 Percent of Tucson Renters Spend More Than One-Third of Income on Rent

An apartment with no furniture...because there is no money for furniture.

An analysis by the website Apartment List says more than half of Tucson renters spend more than one-third of their (our) income on rent.

The site used U.S. Census data from 2007 to 2014 to look into which cities and states have the most "cost-burdened renters," meaning people who give more than 30 percent of their monthly income to a landlord to pay for a roof over their heads. Nationwide, 52 percent of people are "cost-burdened." In Tucson, the number is even higher at 55.6 percent—rent prices continue to increase, but salaries remain low. Employers have high demands, but don't think workers deserve a living wage.

Apparently, San Francisco, Seattle, Denver and Austin did well, because incomes have "increased in line with rent growth." Well, at least Tucson is doing better than Miami, Detroit and Los Angeles, where more than 60 percent of the population is spending a big chunk of their income on rent.

With the U.S. homeownership rate at its lowest since 1967, the U.S. renter population is the largest it has ever been, and now stands at 43 million households. The share of U.S. renters facing cost burdens, however, has risen steadily in the past 50 years, from 24% in 1960 to 38% in the year 2000. Since then, rents have continued to rise steadily, increasing by 3.2% last year – twice the pace of overall inflation.

The past few years have seen modest increases in renter incomes, but they are still lower than 2001 in inflation adjusted terms. As a result, the share of cost-burdened renters (paying more than 30% of their income on rent) has risen in many cities and states across the nation. According to the census data used in our analysis, the share of cost-burdened renters is 40 percent or higher in all but two states as of 2013.